Straker was thinking all this through as he rounded the corner at the bottom of the Edgehill escarpment, when his attention was jolted away. Dropping a gear to start up the long climb, he heard a soul-wrenching growl of protest from his Honda engine. It got worse — before the thing packed up completely, and ground to a halt. Straker tried to restart the engine, but it wouldn’t even turn over. Nothing.
On a blind corner, he was stranded on a slope — fully in the road. Twisting quickly round, concerned about traffic hitting him from behind, he flicked the car out of gear, let it start rolling backwards down the hill and, once freewheeling under gravity, applied a little left-hand-down. With enough momentum, the car soon bumped up off the road, and completely onto the grass verge. There, close in against the hedge, Straker applied the handbrake.
Half an hour later Treadwell arrived to pick him up. There was a blast of Australian piss-taking over the state of Straker’s car. ‘I’ll get Morgans of Kineton to recover it. Probably far more humane to take it straight to the crusher — save everybody’s time.’
They abandoned the Honda on the side of the road, and drove back to the factory. ‘How did you get on with Trifecta?’ Treadwell asked.
Straker explained his tactics and relayed the conversation.
‘Oh to be a fly on the wall when Lyons has to fess up to that lot.’
Straker, though, wasn’t smiling. ‘We will have tweaked the tail of the tiger, all right. And they won’t like it. They’re bound to lash out. We have to be ready, Ollie, for whatever they throw at us next.’
THIRTY-SIX
Straker returned to London by train that same afternoon. Most of the way down through the Chilterns he was smiling to himself — savouring his first obvious move in striking back — and the protection it might afford Sabatino. His thoughts then turned to her in the context of their night together. He spent considerable time on his iPhone, drafting a text. It took him numerous iterations to get the tone and balance exactly right. Finally, as the train pulled out of High Wycombe, he pressed Send.
While waiting for a reply, Straker rang the factory. He pushed Nazar hard for a meeting with the drivers — to discuss Cunzer’s sabotaged suspension, and its implications in light of the other sabotage the team had endured. Although keen, the team principal was concerned about timing — the challenge of arranging a get-together before Monza, given everyone’s commitments elsewhere: he declared he could only give it a try.
Before arriving back in London, Straker got a reply from his text to Sabatino.
It wasn’t what he was expecting. At all.
All it said was: Me too, RS.
And that was it.
How could that be it? What was he meant to make of so little?
Tahm Nazar managed to come up with a clever solution for a meeting with the drivers. A forum was found — on common ground for the key players — surprisingly soon.
Within forty-eight hours Straker was able to meet them and Treadwell in Sussex, at the foot of the South Downs. Both Sabatino and Cunzer had long been scheduled to appear at the Goodwood Festival of Speed. To ensure comfort and privacy for their meeting, Nazar even sent down one of the Ptarmigan motor homes.
The Goodwood estate was bathed in summer sun. A gentle breeze blew across the English countryside. Thousands of people had come to enjoy the day out, and to celebrate the car. All kinds and marques were there — all treasured, cared for, and adored by their owners.
In among the automotive stars were plenty of human ones too. Rally drivers, MotoGP riders, and, in large number, Formula One stars — past and present. All were celebrated by the public — fans just looking for a glimpse of, a moment of interaction with, an autograph from, even a photograph standing beside one of their heroes. Age didn’t matter. Enthusiasm for the stars seemed to be the same from small boys, right up to pensionable men.
Straker was on site and in the motor home ahead of time. There, he waited for the drivers to appear. How was Sabatino going to react? he wondered. To his disappointment, he had heard nothing more from her since that brief text the day after their night together.
Now, waiting for Sabatino, Straker had to admit that he was apprehensive. He became agitated, and then even angry with himself. Why was he feeling this unsure of himself? Disconcerted by his troubles? Certainly they had undermined his confidence in other areas. Was it his divorce? He had never been awkward around women. Was there something else going on? Or was it this woman?
Shortly after eleven, the door of the motor home hissed open and Sabatino climbed up the stairs. Straker waited anxiously to see how she would behave.
She greeted Treadwell, and then him — exactly the same. This was functional — professional to professional. Sabatino was clearly being cool.
That was good, wasn’t it? thought Straker. Put on an indifferent front — not give anything away to the rest of the team. Much better to pretend.
But then there came no breach in the façade from Sabatino. No discreet “Hey you” wink, no hidden-from-other-people’s-view nudge, no accidental physical contact. She was cold. Completely cold. Straker was knocked back. He hadn’t expected anything like such a clinical reception.
After a few minutes, he realized — starkly — that this was to be the shape of it.
Thrown by her coolness, he kept his distance, leaving Treadwell and Sabatino to catch up between themselves — this being the first time the two of them had been face to face since Treadwell’s appointment as Sabatino’s race engineer.
Straker’s reaction to this was far worse than he had expected or feared.
He suddenly felt raw. Trying to rationalize things, he tried to persuade himself it would be easier this way. An intimate relationship — even an emotional one — would have to be complicated in such a high-pressured workplace, wouldn’t it? Mess things up. It had to be better to keep this professional.
Straker worked hard to convince himself that this was the better outcome.
Every time he came close, though, he found himself falling short — coinciding, more or less, with each time he looked at her. Why couldn’t he accept that line? His disappointment increased, almost to the point of distraction. He realized he was going to have to deal with this somehow. He was going to have to go on working with Sabatino. Even letting his feelings show would complicate things. He felt he was in a jam.
Bizarrely, Straker found himself an immediate and powerful cure.
A truly perverse one.
His antidote to all this was to summon up his troubles with the Americans and his flashbacks — which very quickly and all-too effectively distracted him from thoughts of what might have been with Sabatino. Despite the pain that that induced, Straker soon had to smile at his twisted fate. It seemed ironic that the very thing he was trying to escape from had become the antidote to his failing recovery from it.
Around Goodwood, Helli Cunzer, back up and about again after his terrifying Monaco crash — albeit on crutches — was a crowd favourite. Everywhere he went or tried to go he was fêted by fans and admirers. It took him much longer to get anywhere around the showground.
Later than planned, Cunzer climbed up into the Ptarmigan motor home. Sabatino, who hadn’t seen him since her hospital visit in Monte-Carlo, jumped straight up, flung her arms round him and hugged him closely. The contrast of her interaction with Cunzer hit Straker like a train.